Monday, April 14, 2008

Weekend Snapshot #19 - Yikes! Bedbugs!


One of my wards went on a school camping trip to Malaysia 2 weeks ago and brought back bedbugs. When I first saw the bites, I thought they were mosquito bites as there is a construction site behind my backyard. And my area has a few cases of dengue fever.

I sprayed the entire house with insecticide every morning when the kids were at school and used insect repellents. The boy had new bites every morning and then my son got it too. The bites were very itchy, the boys scratched a lot.


On Sunday, sensing something more serious, I checked the internet and discovered that my boys were bitten by bedbugs! These annoying parasites feed solely upon the blood of warm-blooded living things. Panicked, I called a contact at National Environment Agency (NEA) and he was unable to help. :(

I googled for more information and found various ways to solve my problem. I discarded all the boys' mattresses, bedsheets, pillows, blankets...... and rushed to a supermarket to buy Neem Oil (very smelly!) and a 'Bedbug Killer'.

We cleaned out the boys' bedroom, sprayed every nook and corner with the pesticide and wiped bed frames and furniture with Neem Oil. I made the boys used Dettol when they bathe and also mopped the whole house with it. Paranoid! hehe.....

The ugly scars from the bedbugs' bites.







33 comments:

  1. Wow whose hairy legs are those? LOL!

    Bedbugs, kutu and related insects really make our lifes miserable.

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  2. day-dreamer,
    My uber charming, sexy son's legs! hahaha....

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  3. Nasty. My husband gets it all the time in the house in the Philippines. But I never got bitten. He insisted that they are bedbug bites.

    Does the cleaner help? If so, I will get some before I visit him next month.

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  4. andie summerkiss,
    The Bedbug Killer pesticide that I bought is effective. And the Neem Oil (yucky smell).... rub it on the bed frame, the smell will keep the bedbugs away.

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  5. Oh gosh...bedbugs are really annoying little creatures.I am gonna buy the bedbug killer too, thanks for sharing this.

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  6. By the way,I like the new banner!
    Have a great week ahead!

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  7. Oh, no!! we found some once or did they find us?(lol) in a 4-star residence in the French Alps! they can be all over, it seems. My husband was literally attacked on his back, it looked terrible but the bites go away without leaving a scar...
    Good luck on your killer mission :)

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  8. That's a lot of bedbug bites!
    Hates those. Maybe time to clean all the bedsheets, linen, pillows and hang them out in the hot sun!

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  9. I had a 2-3 months battle in my flat in Bt Batok. Problem with bed bugs is that insecticide kill those in areas you can spray, but bed-bugs hide and reproduce in areas which are generally hidden and inaccessible, and their reproduction rate is very high. In the end I bought a solution with suspended white particles which are supposed to attack their nervous system. I won in the end. If you are still battling them after a few weeks, you can email me about what I used. (Note: I'm not a pesticide salesman!) I won the battle one week after that.

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  10. oh gosh, this is so scary!

    hope you can get rid of them real soon!

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  11. eeek! bed bugs. u thre away the mattresses? putting them under the sun should do the job - bed bugs are sensitive to lights and UV.

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  12. Ohhh gosh those are very nasty bites.

    Now I know some idea in case I get bitten too :)

    Thanks for sharing!

    Happy WS!

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  13. notty notty lil bed bug!!! you are such a speedie thinker .. apply a lot of lotion for the boys since they are still young .. i am sure the scar will go off .. :)

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  14. Hope the bugs are gone, once and for all.

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  15. wah.. i see already i also feel gatal... *scratch scratch*

    sleep tight, dun let the bedbugs bite!! let ECL bite nehmind.. hehe..

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  16. lol! cool catch for WS! mine’s up too hope you can drop by.

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  17. I lived in a bed bug infested flat before in London. Didn't know it was so bad. Till a mate told me to check out the seams of my pillow cases and duvet cover for signs of those creatures! Yikes.. I got bites on my neck which look like love bites and were swelling for a week! :( Bad experience¨!!!

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  18. I am not looking at the scars. I am looking at the legs. Whose are they? :)

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  19. Err, bedbugs and dengue. BEDBUGS better lar :P
    I can imagine your agony of giving the house an overhaul in mega cleaning(reminds me of spring cleaning)!!

    I used neem oil for my dog ONCE and gave the bottle away immediately cause everyone in the family yelled my head off with the smell.

    Hope you can get rid of them entirely soon.

    *sings* Sleep tight sleep well, dun let the bedbugs bite...

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  20. Oh mine ... I think I can faint already. So gross!

    I think we once had it in my apartment in KL. In the end, all the guys were thinking of ways to sun the beds... very funny experience looking back.

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  21. Interesting. There was recently a story here on the local news about bed bugs. We hadn't really had a problem here. I think they said it was due to the dry nature of the area. But we came out of a drought recently and now have had quite a few cases reported.

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  22. oh my! those bites look nasty! tell the boys to avoid scratching it so the bites won't get worse. i hope the bites heal soon.

    have a great week!

    Mapped Memories
    Cafe Munchkin

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  23. Ouch, I'm sorry you all have been dealing with that.

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  24. Yikes! Truly horrible creatures, these bedbugs...

    Sleep TIGHT! Don't let the....

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  25. Eeeewwwkk..!! bedbugs suxs..!!

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  26. These look like nasty bites. eeew. I hope your boys are doing better now.

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  27. i hate bedbugs! i sometimes suffer from them too. found any cure for those bedbug scars?

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  28. Ugh. Bed bugs. My parents had that problem for awhile,don't know how they got them either, but it took forever to get rid of them. They ended up taking out the carpet and getting a new bed.

    I'm sorry you had to deal with all that. Hope things will be bug free quickly.

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  29. bed bug's bites are sickening as it will leave permanent scars on your affected skin tissue. I hate it as well, i just got bitten and i feel so depressed and paranoid as i am working in pest control company as well in Singapore. I brought back the bedbugs to my home and now i got to clear them off!!!

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